CHAMPAGNE BOLLINGER AT THE BOOKS THAT BUILT ME, AND THE BOLLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE WINNER 2015 IS ANNOUNCED

“I drink my Champagne when I’m happy and when I’m sad. Sometimes I drink it when I’m alone. When I have company I consider it obligatory. I trifle with it if I’m not hungry and drink it when I am. Otherwise I never touch it — unless I’m thirsty.”
Madame Bollinger 

Today is the first anniversary of The Books That Built Me - what better way to celebrate the salon's birthday than to announce Champagne Bollinger as its official drinks partner. Is there any finer accompaniment to a literary conversation, I wonder?

Champagne Bollinger has form when it comes to fiction: there's Bond of course - Bollinger first makes an appearance in Diamonds are Forever - but it's in the sponsorship of Britain's only prize for comic fiction, The Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize, that the link between Bollinger and books really comes into its own. I had a delightful time at a party with some of the shortlisted authors a few weeks ago, and the winner - Alexander McCall Smith for Fatty O'Leary's Dinner Party - joins an august list of previous prize winners - Hanif Kureshi, Howard Jacobson and Terry Pratchett to name but three.

The first year of The Books That Built Me has been wonderful - I'm enormously grateful to my first guest, Sarah Churchwell, author of Careless People, whose tireless support and encouragement got me off the starting blocks and I'm looking forward very much to the second year and beyond. 

Year two kicks off with marvellous Alex Preston - I look forward to sharing a glass of Bollinger with him, and with all the guests at his salon on 2nd June. 

For tickets to Alex Preston's Books That Built Me at the Club at Cafe Royal, click here. Ticket includes a signed hardback copy of Alex Preston's In Love and War, a glass of Bollinger, delicious Prestat chocolate to take home, a copy of the latest Tatler and a six month subscription to Tatler for you or to give to a friend.